“Wolf, have you not heard, Red Riding left to college years ago and is married with 2 kids of her own, she has not come to Grandmother’s house for 5 years now. What have you done with Grandma, for if it is murder, the axe you will have.”

Dracia Eldren was a sharp featured woman. Her long greying hair was pulled back into a severe coif. Narrowed black eyes studied the potential Princess stand-ins. Darcia was well schooled in the ways of ettiquette. She was a seasoned Mistress. Her name was well known about the different Kingdoms and Queendoms.

She was the woman you contacted when you wanted your daughter to become the well cultured and well taught pillar of nobility. She was the woman who schooled young princesses on the fine art of being noble. Dracia was as strict as they come. Years of practice allowed her to use a switch upon her subject without leaving any marks. Only a sharp stinging pain as a reminder of their failures. She lives for her work.

If you wanted to infiltrate a kingdom with a doppleganger…you needed the help of a professional. One who knew all the ends and outs of Princess behavior.

Her dark grey coat hardly never touched the ground as she walked. Her back arched and her head held up proudly. Darcia fingered the switch at her side as she studied these potentials. These potentials were of poor condition. Some of them were farmer’s daughters. Pathetic. She had her work cut out for her. At all times there would need to be at least three princess replacements in training. They would have to learn together. Eat together and train together. Every movement would have to be perfect. And she only tolerated perfection.

“Odd style, you present yourself with.”
“Yes indeed, it suits me well enough.”
::lunge:: ::parry:: ::cross:: ::reposte:: ::parry::
“Strange you lead with your dagger, yet you attack in defend with your right…”
“I’d honor you with a flourish from my left but that would hardly be fair…”
“First blood it is, on guard!”

“Made on a small island in the Black Sea, it has the power to make a person invinsible in magical concerns, but people should be warned, it has never brought luck to it’s wielders.” Conan Highblade, High Seer of Abasil

“A brand forged in the dying embers of the old gods, such that a pact was formed in the light of the new era. The birthing gods of the lands would attribute to man his due accord or be unmade from the power that bore them. So it came that man was able to vanquish the tribulations that followed.” ~ Caeracyn folklore.

Bromine Lake is a lake that is almost a very small inland sea. It is also special for other reasons. It always has the warmth of a living Human, no matter what the season. It is not a hot spring with its sulfuric chemicals. There are hundreds of theories, but no answers.

Even if they did, they would never believe it, as it has ties to the time of legends, to the time of Corvus.

Sir Whitewing, a typical knight, loyal to his lord to his death and couragous as all get out. Currently leading an army of 10,000 soldiers east to battle the swamp ogres that threaten the borders. Charismatic and rash, he will charge recklessly into battle for his friends, without heed for his life. Smart and out-going he isn’t what most noble’s sons would be.

Scope

Info

The city of Nausopol is built on stilts. Lots of very sturdy stilts and butresses, of course, because it rises about five hundred feet from the ocean. Even the most terrific of storms is only heard in the city as a distant cacophony of blasts as waves strike the solid stonework fathoms below. It has never been attacked because of its isolation and impregnability.

It's not a place for the faint-hearted: vertigo and sea-sickness are not desirable traits. But when you are standing in the middle of the city there is no way you could tell that you were standing above an ocean, separated only by a gulf of air and a few stones.

A thousand steps lead down from Nausopol to the floating docks. These docks are pitch-coated wooden and can be raised by winches during squalls. Trade with other cities and countries is good: Nausopol is built over a sunken atoll whose minerals are still mined by divers, and it was from this that it originally derived its wealth.

But the principal method of getting to and from the city is by riding the giant sea-eagles which have been captured and bred for that very reason.